Books like Sunshine Sketches of a Little Town — picked by fans

When I first read Bridget Jones’s Diary at 13, I was completely captivated by Bridget’s absurdity and freedom.

At the time, I was sure that by the time I was her age, I would already be married with at least two children and a much more “together” life. Still, I found Bridget and her chaotic world endlessly charming.

Fast forward to 37: recently married, no children (and no plans for them), and life looking very different from the neat timeline I once imagined.

Throughout the years, Bridget has been a character I return to again and again while figuring out what adulthood actually looks like. Helen Fielding created a character who captures the messy, funny reality of trying to figure life out in real time.

This book has always hit the trifecta for me—interesting, moving, and funny. A story about London immigrant families in the ‘80s and ‘90s, it shows a lesser-known side of society and certainly is the raunchiest book in my list—there’s a lot of sex among its confused screw-ups.

I admit my mind was opened, and my sympathies widened by this book, and after re-reading, I can appreciate it as a masterpiece of comic chaos. I wouldn’t want to be these characters—how many books begin with a failed suicide attempt?—but I’m glad they let me into their lives.

This is classic, quintessential British humor, the kind of dry wit that makes you laugh out loud as you’re reading. I didn’t want it to end because of how hilarious I found the main character. Even while being funny, the book does a great job establishing the imposter syndrome the main character feels as a member of the middle class attempting to enter the elite halls of academia as an older graduate student.

He is a fish out of water, incapable of having normal social interactions with his peers, “betters,” or students. Possibly, the best-ever hangover scene in writing occurs in this book. 

How often have I heard, “Oh, Q. W. Aardvark’s fantasy is awesome, but you really need to read all 8,326 books in the series to get it”! How about no? Fortunately, I learned the secret of Pratchett’s Discworld series: each novel is freestanding.

I like this book because it’s like a cynical, bitter uncle who secretly has a teddy bear—despite the outward grime and gloom of the setting, there’s a hilarious wit, punning, and barrage of pop references underlying the story that gives it a heart. It’s fantasy for those who don’t think they like it.

I grew up in upstate New York near the Canadian border, and one of the crucial battles of this war was fought there. When I was growing up, we were told this war was a successful one for the United States, and Taylor shows how this was true in some ways but not very true at all in others. 

This is a sprawling tale with a huge cast of characters, and it includes the perspectives of ordinary people from various groups.

I was moved by the profound look into a young man’s grief and guilt and confusion that Canadian author Matt Cohen offered us in this, his last novel. Carl’s mother is dead, killed at the age of 51 in a car accident for which Carl is (mostly) responsible. After the funeral, Carl fled. Now, three years later, he’s back in his hometown, population 684, attempting to start over and reconnect with his seven-year-old daughter. It’s a long, hard fight for redemption in a town where the habitants—a grand cast of them—have long memories of who Carl was and what he did. Matt Cohen died a few weeks after the book won the Governor General’s Prize for English-Language Fiction.

I have rarely encountered a book that captures the local impacts of mining as well as Lianne Leddy’s Serpent River Resurgence. I was impressed with how the author, a Serpent River First Nation member, used oral history and family stories to document how the uranium rush at Elliot Lake, Ontario, irrevocably altered the ability of Serpent River members to hunt, fish, and gather off the land.

To me, the book's real strength was the author’s refusal to depict her fellow community members as victims, highlighting their successful campaign for environmental cleanup of the toxic legacies that remained long after the uranium mines had closed. 

This is both a memoir and the story of a crime. I was interested in this book because the crime happened in the town where I went to university. A crime so close to home seems more frightening, more real.

The author writes a sincere, honest story about how you can be fooled by the person you most want to trust—your husband. I found this book hard to put down. 

I absolutely love Blunt’s writing in this series. It is nuanced and beautifully paired with the troubled, multi-faceted characters. The books are set in the fictional town of Algonquin Bay, based in North Bay in Northern Ontario, a part of the country I know well having grown up a bit farther north and west. The setting permeates the stories—small town, dead of winter, lots of bush and conifer trees. The discovery of a body in a mine shaft fits perfectly. John Cardinal, lead cop, is struggling to help his clinically depressed wife and has recently been demoted. He’s a compelling character and so well drawn as is his new partner Lise Delorme. The books have been made into a gritty television series with superb acting, but I’d say read the books first because the writing is just that good.

The majority of my teaching career was in Regent Park, so the setting of Looking for X is particularly meaningful. Eleven-year-old Khyber is smart, savvy, and mature beyond her years. Told from Khyber’s POV, the story centers around the friendship she develops with X, a woman living in the parkette across from Khyber’s apartment building. When Khyber witnesses X being attacked a group of skinheads, the dangers faced by Toronto’s homeless population, especially those living with mental illness, become glaringly clear. The next day, Khyber is wrongly accused of vandalizing her school. X is the only person who can provide an alibi for Khyber, but she is nowhere to be found. In an effort to locate her friend, Khyber embarks on a a journey navigating the urban landscape of Toronto.